


stops and starts

by phalangine



Category: Constantine (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Getting Together, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-10
Updated: 2018-07-10
Packaged: 2019-06-08 03:12:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15234066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phalangine/pseuds/phalangine
Summary: Funny, the things men do when they're desperate.





	stops and starts

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes I’m terrified of my heart;  
> Of its constant hunger  
> For whatever it is it wants.  
> The way it stops  
> And starts.  
> - _Terrified Heart_ , Poe
> 
>    
>  **cw:** discussion of canonical child abuse, implied institutional abuse and alcoholism

Chas is twenty-one the first time he sees John’s back. It’s late, they’re both comfortably buzzed, and if this were a kinder world, that would be it. Chas would be resting his head on John’s, enjoying the closeness, listening to the soft sounds of John’s breathing, and John would be grumbling at him to stop being a giant. They’d fall asleep like that and wake up with cricks in their necks worse than their hangovers.

Instead, Chas has been banished to one end of the shitty pull-out couch in their shitty hotel room as John fumbles with the buttons on his shirt. There's something electric about him, the same unpredictable snap and crackle Chas is coming to associate with John jumping in with both feet, and this could easily be the start of a one night stand.

It isn’t, though. John wants a lot of things from Chas, but sex isn’t one of them.

Maybe, if he’d had a little more to drink, Chas would admit he wishes that weren’t the case.

That it stings to be the only person John Constantine won’t bat his lashes at.

Chas already knows he loves John, though, and it wouldn’t be a good kind of love if he cared more that John doesn’t want it than he does about loving the bits of John he can have.

So he sits where John told him to and watches his friend cuss under his breath as he slowly gets his button up undone.

He looks like shit. Despite the drinks and beyond the dangerous crackle of impulsivity, John looks like he’s wound so tight he’ll snap, and there’s a desperate look in his eyes Chas hasn’t seen since the first couple months after they met.

Whatever bombshell John’s about to drop on him- and that’s exactly what’s about to happen- Chas knows he’s about as far from ready for it as a person can get.

He doesn’t try to stop John, though.

He’s got a terrible feeling he doesn’t know how.

John is going to do what John is going to do- more often than not, that’s finding trouble- and Chas can feel in the pit of his gin-warm gut that he won’t get better at letting John go into it alone.

This doesn’t feel like trouble- trouble means magic and other people- the hair on the back of his neck is standing up anyway. Danger comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes, and John’s got room enough inside himself to fit them all.

A sharp breath draws Chas’ attention back to John, who’s finally gotten his shirt off. It’s sitting in his lap, his hands white-knuckled where he’s gripping it too hard.

He’s sitting at a different angle now. Before, he had his side aimed at Chas. Now he’s mirroring Chas, facing him head on.

“There’s no good way of saying this,” John says, looking Chas hard in the eye, “and I don’t want to talk about it anyway. But I figure you’ll find out eventually, and it’ll probably be better if you do so now.” His expression shifts from unhappy to something almost amused. “You’ve seen everything else about me and not run off. May as well let you in on this, too, yeah?”

His words come out too fast, the steady torrent that usually pours out of him not so steady anymore, but he stands up and turns around before Chas can ask, pointlessly, if he’s all right.

The light is poor in the room. That must be why it takes Chas so long to realize what he’s looking at.

John’s always been tight-lipped about his life before he came to London. It took a full year for him to admit he’s from Liverpool, as if his accent didn’t give him away.

The only other meaningful personal detail Chas has gotten out of him is that John’s family is made of a sister he hasn’t seen in years, a father he never sees, and a mother who died before John was old enough to know her. Chas only learned that much because John had to update his emergency contact information, and Chas happened to be there when he did it.

It isn’t much of a leap from the burns to John’s father. There aren’t many people who can rattle John, but the name Thomas Constantine did exactly that.

Chas doesn’t mean to move, but he does, scooting forward so he can touch a mark between John’s shoulder blade and his spine.

John twitches, the muscles in his back tensing under Chas' touch, but doesn’t move away.

Chas clenches his jaw as he looks at the other scars- some are old and faded, while others are still vivid against the unmarked stretches of John’s skin, and Chas isn’t sure which has him swallowing against the urge to be sick- and reminding himself that this doesn’t change anything. John is just as capable, just as independent now as he was ten minutes ago. He hasn’t suddenly decided he wants Chas fighting his battles for him.

It isn’t fighting for someone if they’re fighting, too, though, is it?

John specifically said he doesn’t want to talk about it, and the blood rushing in Chas’ ears says they don’t have to talk. He just needs an address.

“I killed me mum,” John says, breaking the silence. “He made sure I knew it.”

It takes every fiber of Chas’ fraying self-control not to tell John it doesn’t matter. That he got out. He’s got friends and an economy size box of condoms stashed somewhere. If he needs a father, they’ll find him a deserving one.

It does matter, though. There’s a world of hate burned into John. He can cover the fresh marks, and time can fade them until they’re so faint they may as well be invisible, but he won’t be able to forget them. The fact of their existence, the memories of how he got them, the reasons why he got them- those were burned into him, too.

Chas grew up in farm country. He knows what it means when you brand with fire.

“Massaging scars helps break up scar tissue,” he hears himself say. “If you wanted, I could-"

John twists around, an odd look on his face. “That’s what you’re going with? A massage?”

Chas feels himself bristle even though he knows he’s the one who messed up. “What am I supposed to say?” he asks. He sounds defensive, and he knows it, but he’s tipsy and wrongfooted, and John’s own father did that to him.

It shouldn't surprise him- Chas knows how little blood means to some people- and as he spots a wayward scar on top of John's shoulder, it doesn't.

The surprise is that it happened to John.

Frowning, John says, “You’re supposed to ask if I killed her.”

“You said you didn’t want to talk about it,” Chas points out. “And I know you didn’t.”

“Is that so?” There’s a challenge on John’s face; he’s ready for Chas to tell him he couldn’t have killed her, to say that John is a good person. To insist that the killing his mother is beyond John. To say a child couldn't kill an adult.

Chas wants to say all that. He does. But he knows John too well to fall into the trap of offering him kindness when he’s looking for pain, so he swallows the impulse. “If you’d killed her,” he says instead, looking John steadily in the eye, “you‘d still be with your dad in Liverpool.”

That catches John off-guard. He blinks at Chas for a long moment, fingers clenching and twisting around his shirt.

Then he laughs.

“You’re a bastard,” he says, but he’s almost smiling. “Must be why I like you.”

Chas’ treacherous heart beats faster.

“Birds of a feather, I guess.”

John doesn’t say anything about his shirt, but he keeps glancing down at it.

Chas can feel how unsettled he is.

There’s no way for John to put his shirt on without making it significant, so, typical John, he’s just sitting there, trying to play it cool even though he obviously wants to get cover himself up again.

Typical Chas, he’s going to give John an out.

Getting to his feet, he says, “Anne Marie left a pitcher of sangria last time she was here. I’ll pour us some if you get the couch ready.”

“Sangria, you say? Nothing says you’ve bonded like mixing liquor.” John gives him a smile that’s only a little too wild. “Pour away, mate. I’ll have things set up out here before you know it.”

Nodding, Chas heads to the tiny kitchen and pours them drinks, and he isn’t at all surprised to return and find that John elected to take his pants off instead of getting the couch ready.

He doesn’t say anything about that, though, because John didn’t put his shirt back on. He’s lying on his back on the couch, squinting up at the ceiling, shirtless.

When he glances down and sees Chas, he shrugs. He keeps his eyes on Chas, though, and the weight of the situation drops onto Chas all at once.

He looks back at John as steadily as he can when he can feel their friendship on the line.

Whatever Chas does next, it has to be right, or John will leave. John doesn’t need to say it aloud; Chas knows him too well to think John will stick around if things aren't the way he wants.

John may call Chas his “best mate”, but there are lots of people in London. Lots of roadies and musicians and singers. Lots of other taxi drivers, too, if he wants to keep the theme. It was only chance that he stumbled into Chas’ cab, after all.

Maybe Chas ought to resent him for it, but the thought comforts him instead. No matter what happens to Chas, John will make it out the other side.

Quietly, deep down where John can’t hear him, Chas commits himself to making sure that stays true.

Then he gives himself a mental shake and finishes making his way to the couch. “You took your pants off but left your shoes on, huh?”

John pulls his feet in just enough for Chas to squeeze himself onto the cushion under them.

“You’re still an ass,” Chas says as he passes John his mug. “And you’re still sleeping on the floor like you said you would.”

Like he always says he will, not that he ever does. John is good at weaseling his way out of it, and Chas can’t say he minds. It’s nice, having somebody cuddling up with him, and if John is here with Chas, he isn’t out getting into trouble. So Chas doesn’t push him off or complain too much when John puts a knee in Chas’ kidney.

That’s the key to being friends with John. There’s no changing him, no making him better than he is. You just breathe through the pain until it passes.

John studies Chas for a beat, then quirks a brow at him. “No more offers to fix me?” he asks. “No reassurances that I’m still desirable?”

Chas rolls his eyes. “You know damn well that people desire you, and the only thing about you that needs fixing is your taste in beer.”

“My taste in beer is impeccable, mate.”

“Bullshit.”

“Oh?” John’s eyes light up, and Chas barely has time to swallow his mouthful of sangria before John is launching himself at him.

They wind up wrestling on the floor, laughing and wiggling and too tipsy to do much more than rolling around, until suddenly they aren’t.

John manages to roll them so he’s on top with Chas under him. He doesn’t go for the pin, though. He just looks down at Chas with those soft brown eyes of his.

“You’re all right, Chas,” he says, nodding to himself as if what he just said makes any sense. “It’s past your bedtime, though, mate.”

He gets up without another word, smoothly moving from sitting to standing.

It takes Chas a little longer to remember how to work his legs.

He sets the bed up, and John doesn’t bother pretending he isn’t going to climb in the moment it’s ready.

Later- weeks later- Chas will find out that John had a fight with a would-be one night stand about keeping his shirt on before he suggested they get drinks, and he’ll start to wonder. There won’t be a good way of bringing it up, though, so he’ll put it aside.

 

xx

 

“Chas.”

Chas doesn’t bother getting up, doesn’t even lift his head. He just waves at John to come in.

This is part of an established ritual. They go to their own beds, or someone else’s, but if Chas is at home by a certain time and John is home at a certain time, John will come to his room. He’s got a key to Chas’ apartment; the only barrier between him and his final stop is Chas.

Chas isn’t much of a barrier, though. He never says no.

John’s footsteps are heavy today, Chas thinks as he tracks John’s approach.

He feels the mattress dip as John lies down, bringing a rush of cool air with him as he slips under the blankets. There’s a long moment of nothing, but Chas knows things aren’t done.

Sure enough, the springs groan as John shifts closer.

And closer.

And closer.

And even closer, the old mattress protesting as John finishes his journey and ends up pressed flush against Chas’s side, one leg crossing over Chas’ and one hand coming up to rest on Chas’ shoulder blade.

He's been doing this since Newcastle. During the day, he’s fine if you ignore the dark circles and the way he’s obviously pushing himself to look normal.

At night, he’s too quiet. He barely breathes Chas’ name and moves through the apartment like death.

The silence is stretching, and Chas didn’t even wake that much when John came in, so he’s dozing comfortably when John says, “I don’t want you to leave.”

Chas’ heart stops.

“It’s a good thing you’re not awake to hear me say that,” John continues with a quiet, forced laugh. He moves his hand, his fingers lightly brushing over Chas’ skin. “Everybody else left- even Ritchie. And they were right to do it. I know that. But you stayed. Selfish fuck that I am, I'm glad for it. And I want you to keep doing it. I want you to choose me, and I want to hear you say it. I want-" He blows out a hard breath. "I want a lot of things from you, Chas.”

Chas doesn’t know what to say- doesn’t know if he should say anything at all- and in the silence that leaves, John sighs. “Always wanting what I can’t have, I am.”

He falls silent after that, the only sounds the whisper of the sheets and the creak of the springs as he shifts, making himself more comfortable, and he, like Chas’ hazy recollection of what John said, will be gone by morning.

 

xx

 

It’s one AM, and Chas is slowly nodding off again after Renee kicked him in the shin in her sleep when someone starts pounding on the door downstairs.

“If that’s John, he better be dying,” Renee grumbles. She isn’t angry, but she will be in the morning.

Chas sighs and mumbles his agreement as he rolls out of bed and stiffly makes his way across the room.

It takes him longer than usual to get to the front door. Renee’s gotten to the point in her pregnancy where she’s having trouble sleeping, and when Renee doesn’t sleep, Chas doesn’t sleep. He can feel it when she’s uncomfortable and unhappy and lonely even when he's next to her. So he spends a lot of time doing what he can to make her feel better- midnight foot rubs and break of dawn runs for ice cream and changing the sheets even though they went on yesterday because Renee swears they smell funny- or, when it’s been too long since he slept and he’s worried about crashing the cab, curling up on their lumpy couch in the hopes that he’ll catch an hour or two of sleep. His boss pointed at him as Chas limped into work the other day and said, "You're too young for sciatica," which Chas is doing a great job of not telling him to fuck off about.

By the time he opens the door, John is leaning heavily against the house. There’s blood all over him, but he scrapes together the energy to give Chas one of his shiteating grins.

“Bad time?” he asks.

Chas swallows the urge to shut the door and lock it, but John would either pick the lock or worse, leave.

“How much of it is yours?” Chas asks wearily, stepping back and beckoning at John to follow him inside.

John does, falling into step behind Chas without argument. “I’m not actually sure.”

That isn’t a surprise. John isn’t acting like he’s lost enough blood to coat him like he is- he isn’t having trouble walking or talking, and when they reach the bathroom and Chas flicks the light on, John only grimaces a bit before he settles on the toilet- but experience has taught Chas to be careful. John is good at lying, to himself and to other people. It’s reflexive, Chas suspects, but that doesn’t negate the fact that Chas can’t be sure of what’s going on until he’s checked John over.

“Take off your shirt,” he orders absently. “I’ll get the box.”

This doesn’t happen often. John is keeping his distance, has been since Chas and Renee got married, but he does come around sometimes. Occasionally he just wants to chat, check in on them. Well, check in on Chas. The cursory hello he gives Renee hardly counts, but it’s probably for the best that he doesn’t try to be friendly with her.

Usually he’s hurt in a way he can’t patch up by himself.

It doesn’t take much to start a habit, and Chas has always been prone to making rituals.

He doesn’t know when he started keeping a large bowl and stack of old washcloths with the first aid kit, but considering the messes John makes of himself, Chas doesn’t begrudge having it on hand.

He’s standing at the sink, his back to John, waiting for the boiler to wake up and turn the cold water warm when John hisses.

Chas doesn’t drop the bowl or startle. He knows that sound, knows all the ways John vocalizes unhappiness, and that one was more surprise than pain.

“Puncture, cut, or something special?”

“Something special,” John replies, sounding intrigued. “Burn, I think. Hard to tell with magical attacks. They don’t exactly abide by the usual rules.”

The water is finally warm, so Chas slips the bowl under the stream. “Big?”

“Not particularly. Just in a delicate place.”

Chas’ hands tighten around the bowl without his permission. “Define ‘delicate’,” he says, keeping his voice even. He could turn and look, but he knows better.

He’s been married for more than a year. He and Renee have a good relationship, one that’s built on honesty and trust. He knows she doesn’t like John, and he knows why, just like she knows there’s a part of Chas that loves John and can’t let him go.

Somehow, it isn’t fidelity that concerns her.

“I know you can’t help having a big heart, Chas,” she said after a night like this one, where he patched John up then watched him leave. “I love that about you. I do. But if you aren’t careful, you’re going to break that big heart trying to give it to someone who doesn’t want it.”

Renee has never been one to pull her punches, which he’s always liked, but there are times Chas wishes she didn’t also always go for the throat.

Unaware of Chas’ inner turmoil, John hums thoughtfully. His clothes rustle as he shifts, no doubt trying to get a better look at the wound.

“Just my side, mate,” he says at last. There’s something off about his tone, so Chas waits for whatever John is holding back.

The water starts to run over the sides of the bowl as he does, and Chas forces himself to unclench his hands. He shuts the water off and tips the excess out but still doesn’t turn around.

Finally, after another solid minute, John says, “Got a bit on me stomach, too, I suppose.”

Chas lets himself take one bracing breath before he scoops up the bowl and joins John at the toilet.

Somebody, somewhere, said it isn’t good to see people without their armor.

That’s the feeling that shivers its way down Chas’ spine as he drops to his knees at John’s side, the first aid kit already waiting for him on the floor.

Without the trenchcoat and button up, John looks like any other man. Exhausted. Battered. Unhappy.

Chas can help with one, maybe two, of those.

“Will the regular kit do?” he asks as he wets a cloth. His heart is beating too fast, but that’s between him and his chest. “Or is this going to require some of the special stuff?”

John sighs. “Ordinarily I’d tell you to skip right to the magic, but this particular creature was a bit of a mongrel, I think. Best do both.”

Nodding, Chas does. He carefully washes the wound- whatever John fought, it was all kinds of messy- and the skin around it. Once he’s got the area clean, he pats it dry, noting John's wince but not bothering to mention it. Then he fishes out one of John’s magic salves- the one that feels cold even through the jar- and gently works it into the wound.

John sucks in a breath through his teeth at the first touch of Chas’ fingers, but he doesn’t complain or try to leave.

It’s slow going. The salve is thick, and there’s a lot of John to cover.

Chas’ fingertips go numb before he’s a quarter of the way through, but it's a familiar feeling. The salve isn’t actually cold; that's just the way his body makes sense of the magic it contains. Chas could wear gloves made for climbing Everest, but he’d still wind up with numb fingers from handling the salve. The cold isn’t physical, so it can’t be stopped by physical things.

Or so John says.

When it comes to magic, Chas still can't be sure when John’s being honest and when he’s bullshitting.

John lets Chas work without commentary, which is unsettling. John always has a comment. He never shuts up; if his mouth is shut, then he’s making faces or using some other body part (Two particular body parts, really- John is fond of flicking the V).

Chas pauses with the fingers of his right hand in the jar and looks up.

There’s an odd look on John’s face. Chas can’t think of a single time he’s seen it before, and he has no idea what it’s supposed to mean. He can’t even tell if it’s good or bad.

“You okay?” he ventures.

John raises his brows, and Chas rolls his eyes.

“Besides the obvious,” he revises, “are you okay?”

It takes John a second longer than it should, but he nods. “Just realized I missed you, is all,” he says, shrugging and looking away.

Chas’ heart does something complicated and nauseating. “You could come by more often, you know,” he points out as he goes back to work.

John lets out a single, sharp laugh, his body jerking under Chas' hands. “I don’t think your missus would take kindly to that.”

No, she wouldn’t. But she’d be fine so long as she didn’t have to deal with John herself.

“You’ll see the baby, though,” Chas says, keeping his tone firm and far away from questioning. “She’s due in less than a month.”

John doesn’t respond right away, and as the seconds tick by, Chas starts to wonder if he will at all.

“You’re not really gonna name the poor girl Geraldine, are you?” John asks.

Chas should be annoyed at being second-guessed, but he only mentioned the name to John once, and that was weeks ago.

John can pretend to be cold and uninterested all he wants. Chas knows better.

“It’s a good name,” he protests.

“It’s an _old_ name, Chas. Your wife isn’t pushing out somebody’s nan.” John tips his head, considering. “Is she?”

Chas pushes a little too hard as he applies the last of the salve.

“Jesus!” John grunts.

“Oops,” Chas says.

John glares down at him. “It’s a good thing you’re not an actor, mate. I hope you know that.”

Chas shrugs, John’s playful mood lost on him. He’s covered the worst of the burn with the salve; all that’s left is covering it. Then John will leave.

Like he always does.

Wrapping the wound isn’t difficult. Chas takes a few seconds at the box, weighing the options, before he settles on tape and plastic wrap. John obligingly raises his arms, and Chas loops the film around his abdomen. He keeps it loose; John is especially bad at keeping still when he’s hurt, and he’s just going to have to take it off when he gets to wherever he’s staying and gets in the shower.

“Do me a favor and give it the hour it needs to soak in, will you?” Chas asks. He’s swapping the plastic wrap for the tape, so he doesn’t have to see John roll his eyes.

Typical John, he doesn’t reply until Chas is securing the plastic wrap with a length of tape low on John’s belly.

“Anything for you, mate,” John says, his voice too soft.

Chas could say a hundred cruel things in response to that lie, but he doesn’t. He just smooths the last length of tape over the seam above John’s ribs.

“You’re all set,” he says, getting to his feet. “Next time, try dodging.”

John snorts, standing up himself as Chas moves off to start cleaning up.

Usually he leaves right away.

This time, he hangs around. He doesn’t say why, doesn’t say anything at all, just hovers by the wall, holding his ruined shirt and bloodied coat, watching as Chas washes his hands, then washes out the bowl and rises the washcloths and runs a dry towel over the floor to mop up the mess there. He shadows Chas to the laundry room, still saying nothing as Chas tosses the cloths into the washing machine and pours the bleach.

Chas wants to ask him to stay, wants John to let himself be tended to and checked on so he heals right, but Chas can only get turned down so many times.

He walks to the front door, John trailing behind.

“Take care of yourself, John,” Chas says as he opens the door for him, wishing he didn’t know it’s pointless. John will survive. He’ll kick and claw and drag himself out of death’s grip with nothing but his own strength of will. But beyond that...

John doesn’t know how to care for himself, and Chas has finally come to accept that that’s because John doesn’t want to know. He’s fine bouncing from bed to bed, brush with death to brush with death.

And Chas can’t change a single damn bit of it.

John doesn’t leave right away. He tilts his head, studying Chas for a long moment.

“It's a good name,” he says at last, looking away from Chas and out the door. “Tell Renee to relax. She’ll be a healthy one, your girl. Happy, too- got a long life ahead of her.”

Chas swallows hard. “John-”

“Don’t get all weepy. It was a simple spell. Didn’t even require any blood or bits of my soul.” Shrugging into his coat, John cuts a look back at Chas. “You’ve got a good thing here, you know. A good family.”

He’s gone before Chas can reply- out the door and down the steps and swallowed up by the night in the blink of an eye.

It’s for the best, Chas knows. If John had stayed, Chas would have pointed out that John is his family, too, and that wouldn’t have gotten them anywhere.

 

xx

 

John’s in the hospital with the kinds of injuries that make Chas sick just remembering the way the nurse's mouth shaped them.

He was lying on the side of the road when Chas found him. An old friend called, told Chas about a demon he and John went after just outside Tallahassee. Said John had a plan for killing it but he had to do something dangerous to get at it.

They got the demon, but John was nowhere to be found.

After years of wishing John would slow down a little, the sight of him lying motionless on the road made Chas’ stomach roll.

He’s too still here, too.

His heart is beating steadily, and his breaths are coming easily. But it’s six PM. He should be fighting a demon or trying to talk Chas into cooking them a big meal. Anything that isn’t lying flat on his back, eyes closed, not making a sound.

Chas curls his fingers around John’s wrist.

He’s gotten used to hanging back, watching John sprint ahead, running headlong into places where Chas can’t follow. He thought he’d gotten used it, to the endless stretches of time where all he can do is wait and worry.

Typical of John to find a new way to twist the knife and push it deeper and not even watch.

 

xx

 

It’s been almost two years since the divorce went through. Chas still doesn’t have it in him to go out and look for company. Not the one-off kind or the long term kind.

John finds plenty of the former but none of the latter.

It isn’t hope for himself that makes Chas’ heart unclench every time John comes home alone after a night in someone else’s bed.

People John loves die, and none of them has had the kindness to take him with them.

A man should only have to survive so much lost love.

They go out together usually, if only because it’s more convenient for Chas to be there already if John strikes out.

It doesn’t happen nearly as often as it should, but it does happen.

They opted to stay in tonight, though. The taxi needs a look-over after their last demon, and Chas knows the car too important not to keep an eye on the parts that make it go.

He takes one beer with him and leaves the others on ice with John, who settles himself on one of the detached seats. Chas would warn him against that, if only for the sake of cleanliness, but it’s pointless.

Besides, Chas knows from the way John’s been wordlessly staring into empty space that a storm is brewing.

John can be quiet. He isn’t especially good at it- it isn’t in his nature- and he doesn’t like it, but if he has to, John can sit and wait and not make a sound.

This is a different sort of quiet. This is the kind of quiet that comes when liquor is melting the locks on thoughts that wouldn’t normally come undone.

Chas sips his beer and does some basic checks on the engine and waits.

If John says something he regrets, they’ll just pretend he didn’t.

As Renee would be the first to point out, Chas is an old hand at ignoring problems.

“You’re a mechanic, aren’t you?” John asks, finally breaking the silence. He turns his head to look at Chas, and there‘s nothing there. Not anger, not sadness, not even the inexplicable affection he’s had for Chas since they met. Just a smooth, uninterested mask. “Didn’t go to school for it, I know, but I’ve never seen anyone else touch that thing.”

“I know my way around the taxi, yeah,” Chas replies carefully. He doesn’t know where John is going with this, and he doesn’t like not knowing where John is going. “Can’t have it falling apart when we’re in the middle of something.”

John shakes his head. “It’s not just the engine. You know about the- the belts and all that. You even took the seats out.”

“I did.”

“Nobody on earth knows this car as well as you know it. Inside and out, I bet there isn’t a bit of it you don’t know how to fix.” Leaning back, he gives Chas a hard look. “Nobody knows me as well as you do. You know something’s not right. I know you do. So why can’t you fix it?”

Chas swallows against the rush of empty reassurances that want to spill out. You’d think he would’ve gotten over that impulse, but somehow it’s only gotten stronger.

The answer is obvious, and John already knows it.

“You’re not a machine.”

“I suppose I’m not,” John drawls, eyes hard, “and you’re not a doctor, are you?”

Bracing for the blow that’s sure to come, Chas shakes his head. “I’m not a doctor, no.”

“Which means you can’t help me. And if you can’t help me, what bloody good are you?” John asks tonelessly.

Chas doesn’t have an answer, and from the way John knocks back his drink, he doesn't want one.

 

xx

 

Ravenscar did a number on John. He won’t admit it, won’t even tell Chas what happened while he was there, but he’s even more unstable than he was before he admitted himself.

Chas doesn’t know anyone else who’s been in a place like that. John coming out twitchy and defensive doesn’t seem like the right outcome, but he can’t be sure. Even if it is bad, he doesn’t have the first idea of what to do.

So it continues: John and the misery that’s soaked into him and the growing number of bottles in the sink.

Chas hopes, foolishly, that maybe John’s just having trouble remembering how to live an unscheduled life. There are all sorts of choices people have to make when they’re on their own that John wasn’t making.

Chas figures he can give John time, let him readjust.

That decision gets overturned when he finds John trying to cast a spell to keep himself from sleeping.

He doesn’t say that’s what it’s for, but Chas has seen this particular arrangement of grotesque items before.

“You don’t want to talk about it,” Chas says before John can.

John nods, slowly curling defensively over the ingredients of his magical bad decision.

“Then don’t. But put that shit away.”

John hesitates.

“I can’t fix you, John,” Chas presses, “but neither can that. At least my way won’t set the place on fire because you picked the wrong word.”

John would normally argue that point.

This time, he steps away from the table and follows Chas to Chas’ room. Without being told, he gets in, scooting so his back is against the wall. Chas slides in after him, letting the space between them remain open, giving John simple options: stay, come closer, leave.

It’s less than a minute before John is closing the gap and pressing himself against Chas’ side.

“I get nightmares,” he says into Chas’ chest. “I’ll probably wake you up.”

Chas doesn’t tell John that he already knows about the nightmares. He’s heard the shouting. “Then you’ll wake me up.”

“You say that like it doesn’t matter.”

Chas was there every night when Geraldine was a baby. He can survive being woken in the middle of the night.

It wasn’t fun, but he loved her more than he wanted to sleep. He held her tiny body in his arms as she wailed, and he loved her so much he felt his heart break. He couldn't pretend he didn't know she was unhappy, and he couldn't pretend he didn't know she'd stop crying if he held her.

He loves John, too. It’s a different love, but as John flexes his fingers, bunching up Chas’ shirt in his fist, Chas feels his heart break again.

 _It doesn’t,_ he thinks. It never has.

 

xx

 

Zed doesn’t come back with John when they finish a run to Alabama. That’s the first clue that something’s wrong. Zed doesn’t like not being in the mill house. It’s the safest place she has, and as much as she needs to leave and learn with John, she always comes right back when they’re done.

The second clue is that John does come right back.

The third clue is the way he’s favoring his right leg.

Chas pretends he doesn’t see it when John hobbles in for dinner. John doesn’t mind pain; he doesn’t even mind being seen feeling it. But suggesting that he should do something about it- suggesting that the pain should be relieved because it’s slowing him down… John won’t tolerate that.

So Chas lets him eat his eggs and only asks about the spirit Zed found.

When they finish, he does the dishes and pretends not to hear John’s uneven footsteps as he drags himself away.

Chas lets John have two loud thumps before he gets up and washes his hands. He lingers in the kitchen, not touching anything, until he hears a third thump and goes to check on John.

He hears a fourth while he’s still making his way to John’s room.

The door isn’t shut all the way, but Chas knocks anyway.

A fifth thump follows immediately.

Chas waits, fighting the urge to kick the door in.

John sighs audibly, and a moment later, Chas hears the floor creak as John makes his way over.

Finally, the door swings open.

“Took you long enough.”

There’s a rebuttal on the tip of Chas’ tongue as he steps inside, but it fizzles into nothing when John limps fully into view, crossing from the door to his bed. He’s down to his boxers, which would be a greater distraction if not for the bloody bandages and washcloths strewn across the bed.

John openly winces as he sits on the edge of the mattress.

Chas stares at him for a long moment. “What the hell, John?”

“Strix,” John says, as if that means anything. “It’s a Roman creature,” he explains when Chas fails to react to the word. “A bad omen if generally not a problem themselves, but they do have a taste for flesh, and they’ll take a snap at humans now and then.”

“You didn’t mention any monsters earlier.”

“It’s just a bird, Chas. A very old, very hungry bird with a fair bit of magical significance, sure, but still a bird.”

Chas doesn’t point out the flaws in John’s logic. It would take too long. Instead, he shakes his head and points at the mess on the bed. “I’m guessing that bird is the reason your bed looks like a scene from a World War I documentary.”

“Please, Chas. They didn’t have color back then.”

John says it like it’s a joke. And to him, it probably is. He doesn’t care about his life so long as he's the one giving it up. His inevitable death and his earned torment are the only consequences that matter.

What’s thirty years of scattered fractures compared to eternity of focused damnation?

“Show me,” Chas tells him.

Lifting the hem of one leg of his boxers, John does.

“That needs a doctor,” Chas says, wishing he’d eaten less earlier. A doctor and at least one nurse. Possibly an orderly or two as well. “Jesus Christ, John.”

“Nah, no need for all that. I stopped the bleeding myself with a special little spell. The problem is, it’s unfinished, and I don’t know the bit to sew the flesh together again. My Sanskrit just isn’t good enough to fill in the blanks, it seems.”

Of course. Of course that’s the way John thinks healing should be done.

“I’ll get the suture kit.”

John doesn’t object, and when Chas gets back, John has organized the blood-soaked evidence into two piles.

Chas doesn’t comment on them, just settles himself on the floor between John’s spread legs.

The first touch of his hand to John’s thigh gets a twitch of surprise. Chas lets that, too, go without comment.

“The topical analgesic wouldn't do much for this,” Chas tells him instead. “And I don’t know enough about medicine to know whether it would even be safe to try it over this much of you.”

“Don’t worry about it,” John says, waving him off. “Wouldn’t be the first time I got sewn up without my old friend APAP. Those Lamaze techniques aren't total horseshit.”

 _That isn’t the point,_ Chas thinks. He doesn’t doubt John’s capacity for enduring pain, but the past doesn’t exist to be repeated and outdone.

Chas doesn’t try to tell John that. He just urges John’s leg open a little wider and gets to work.

As promised, John breathes through it.

Chas tries not to think about how John got to be so good at enduring pain, but he does it anyway.

He’s still thinking about John, twenty years old and too thin and angry enough burn any bridge at a moment’s notice, and that night on the sofa as he ties the usual surgeon’s knot, securing his work.

Without intending to, he brushes his thumb just under the line of stitches.

John’s legs twitch, his thighs closing around Chas for a second.

He doesn’t apologize, and Chas doesn’t ask him to.

Chas should get up and go to bed.

John should tell him to go.

Instead, John says nothing, and Chas runs his thumb over that bit of skin again, keeping his eyes firmly on John’s leg as he does.

This time, when John’s legs close around him, John hooks the leg on his undamaged side over Chas’ shoulder.

They don’t talk for a long time.

Chas gently touches the skin around the stitches, feeling the warmth of John’s leg against the cool air as he moves his hand. It’s easy to forget that John isn’t the one with immortality, however borrowed. There’s an energy to him, an alacrity that tricks Chas into thinking John is more than a very lucky thief.

The hair on John’s thigh tickles his palm as Chas shifts his hand away from the wound and toward John’s knee.

He fits his palm to the the front of it, curling his hand around John’s kneecap.

“I’m tired, Chas.”

Startled, Chas looks up at John.

John doesn’t look back. He stares at a point on the far wall, or maybe beyond it, as he says, “I’m so goddamn tired.”

“I could get-”

“Won’t work.” John glances down, meeting Chas’ eyes for a half second before looking away. “I’ve tried it all. The teas, the herbal remedies, the prescriptions…” He snorts. “All these years, and I’ve only found the one remedy.”

“You gonna tell me what it is so I can get it?”

“No need. It’s already here, just beyond my reach. A modern Tantalus, I am.” He frowns. “Haven’t eaten any other humans or killed any of me own sons, though.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

John draws a long breath in through his nose but doesn’t speak. Instead, he reaches for the hand Chas has on his knee and lays his over it, sliding his fingers between Chas’.

He looks at their joined hands for a long moment before he looks at Chas’ face.

_Oh._

Chas swallows. “You never said anything.”

“Didn’t want you to know.”

That’s a pitfall disguised as a confession, and Chas dodges it by asking, “So why now?”

“Got tired of all that Greek misery, I think,” John says slowly.

Nodding like he understands, Chas slowly moves the hand under John’s, twisting it so their palms are pressed together.

“I’ve loved you for a long time, John.”

John’s hand twitches, briefly giving Chas’ hand a sharp squeeze. “You think this is new?” He shakes his head. “Mate, I’ve been arse over tea kettle for you since I fell into your cab.”

It’s romantic, the idea of John for him at first sight, exactly the sort of answer Chas has quietly wished for, but he knows better than to think the Venn diagram of truth and romance is a circle.

John knows better, too.

“You were everything I wanted all rolled into one,” he says, shrugging. “I didn’t know it then, sure. I knew I wanted to get you into bed, though, and the longer I spent trying to figure out if you wanted the same thing, the more of you I realized I wanted.”

He looks down at their hands, falling silent as he thinks through his next words.

“People like you because you’re steady,” John says slowly, still looking at their hands. “We both know that’s not quite true, though.”

There’s no bite to the words, and Chas lets the reminder of his temper go unchallenged.

“I was an even bigger bastard when we met than I am now, wasn’t I? So used to fear and anger I didn’t know how to handle anything else if it didn’t involve fucking.”

Chas lifts his free hand and curls it around John’s ankle.

John closes his eyes. “There you were, walking around like you weren’t a fantasy straight out of my most embarrassing dreams.” John opens his eyes and shakes his head, remembering something he chooses not to share. “And you were so easy to like. So happy to help. I thought I’d get over my crush with time. But the days became weeks, and the weeks turned into months, and somehow I was watching the band break up, but my biggest fear was you disappearing with it.”

Chas bites his tongue, not sure what he wants to say but knowing that whatever it is, this isn’t the time.

“I’m tired, Chas.”

There’s nothing Chas can say to that.

John is slumped forward, though, his head not far above Chas’, and it’s a simple thing to lean up and in, to linger inches from John’s face, letting him decide which way they go.

He smells like sweat, and when he dips his head and meets Chas' lips, he tastes like the whisky he keeps in the flask they don’t talk about.

Chas takes his hand off John’s ankle and guides John’s leg off his shoulder. Then he puts his hand on John’s thigh, leaning on it as he stretches up for another kiss.

John kisses him back, grabs the front of Chas’ shirt and uses it to keep him close.

When they separate, John doesn’t let go.

“Stay,” he says quietly.

Chas nods. He isn’t entirely sure what he’s promising, but John’s looking at him like he needs this, and Chas has never been good at telling John no.

John quirks a soft smile at him, looking reassured, then starts tugging on Chas’s shirt, pulling at him until Chas gets the message and joins him on the bed. The twin mattress is too short for him, but John is running his hand through Chas’ hair and kissing the corner of Chas’ mouth, and the mattress is the least important part of the moment.

 

xx

 

The moment they finish with the wraiths in the Louisiana, Zed grabs Jim’s hand and practically tows him to his car. She doesn’t acknowledge John and Chas beyond a curt wave while her back is turned.

“Do you think they’ll actually make it to his apartment?” John asks. He’s unusually clean for having just fought a group of monsters. “Or will they just pull over somewhere quiet and hop in the back? Jimbo probably knows all the good spots. He's a cop, after all.”

“I’m surprised you think they’ll actually manage to get out of their seats,” Chas replies blandly, knowing the best way to discourage John is not to engage with him.

John gives him a suspicious look but doesn’t call him out. “Speaking of getting places, how’s the shoulder?”

Wincing, Chas shrugs- with one arm. “Can’t heal until I get all the shrapnel out.”

“It doesn’t get rid of things on its own?”

“It can, but it takes a long time, and it feels... weird.” Weird isn’t quite right, but there isn't a good way to describe the sensation of his body shifting and pushing something out.

“Weird, eh?” John echoes, the corners of his lips starting to lift.

“Very weird,” Chas agrees rather than trying to explain. He holds a hand out a little, inviting John to take it but not pushing. John’s boundaries are hard to read, always have been. They shift without warning; even John himself doesn’t always know where they are until he runs into them.

John opts to cup Chas’ elbow instead of taking his hand, which isn’t a bad middle ground. “Can’t have the muscle feeling weird, now can I?” he asks as he leads Chas to the taxi.

Chas lets himself be pulled. After years of watching John run off with other people, it’s still disconcerting to remember that John is hurrying Chas because it’s Chas he’s looking to spend the night with. The pulling is grounding, a reminder that John really is looking to spend his after with Chas.

When they get to the taxi, John doesn’t quite run around to the passenger side, but he’s moving faster than he needs to. And when he catches Chas’ eye over the roof, he winks.

Shrapnel in the shoulder isn’t the only weird feeling, but unlike shrapnel, Chas is looking forward to adjusting to having so much of John’s open attention.

Chas gets in and, after a little searching finds his keys.

There’s no law against driving one handed, even when you’re driving standard.

John doesn’t particularly like it, though.

“If we die in thirty degree heat, I’m going to be very unhappy with you,” he grits as Chas takes his hand off the wheel to change gears for the fourth time.

Chas snorts and doesn’t correct him to Fahrenheit. “It’s not my fault the road isn’t a straightaway.”

“Yeah, well…”

John’s arms are folded, and if Chas weren’t down a hand, or if his bad arm were the one closer to John, he’d reach out and touch him. As it is, the best he can offer is a quick brush of the back of his hand against John’s arm before Chas takes hold of the wheel once again.

“I realize you’re very demonstrative, and usually I enjoy that aspect of your personality, but we are driving down twisting rural roads, Chas,” John says tersely. “Focus.”

“I am.”

“On driving, Chas.”

Chas nods and does as John asks. John doesn’t drive; he’s got no idea how much of it is actively paying attention and how much of it may as well be muscle memory. Depending on his mood, he seems to think driving is all one or all the other.

It took Chas years to convince him that driving one handed on a highway doesn’t really put Chas in more danger than driving with both.

If John finds out that that isn’t entirely true, Chas is going to catch hell, but America is big, and holding the wheel at ten and two for thirteen hours is unbearable.

John doesn’t talk for the rest of the ride, but Chas can feel him thinking. He feels it the whole way to the hotel and up the stairs and into their room. He feels it as John kicks off his shoes and walks over to the A/C. He feels it as he heads into the bathroom and starts awkwardly trying to shrug out of his shirt.

“You could just rip it,” John says eventually, appearing in the doorway. “The shoulder’s already ripped, and there’s blood all over.”

“It’s usually an undershirt, so I can fix the shoulder rips with some quick stitches,” Chas replies, torn between talking and getting his shirt over his head. “And even if the blood stains, I can still use it.”

“But you could just get another. It’d be easier.”

“Yeah, well, I like this one, all right?” Chas snaps. He relents as soon as he’s said it, but John waves him off before Chas can apologize.

He comes over to the sink and moves Chas a little, putting himself between Chas and the mirror. “Let me.”

Chas does, ducking his head when John motions for him to and twisting to help free his good arm.

John is unusually gentle when he pulls the sleeve down Chas’ wounded arm, carefully pulling the shirt away from the metal sticking out of Chas’ flesh before he tugs on it. And he shushes Chas when he objects to John dropping the shirt on the floor.

“Just the two bits, right?” he asks.

Chas nods.

There’s something odd about the atmosphere. He and John have been naked with each other plenty of times. Sometimes because they’re having sex and sometimes because they just can't be bothered to get dressed. They’ve showered together and seen each other injured, too.

If John were going to reject something about Chad, he would have done it already.

But as John runs his fingers over the raised and angry skin around the metal, Chas finds himself wondering.

“Can I do it?” John asks, breaking the silence.

Chas frowns. “Can you do what?”

“The shrapnel.”

It’s been a long day- a long three days- and despite his earlier worrying, Chas doesn’t have it in him to get worked up over this new interest of John’s. He gestures at John to go ahead.

And John does. Just reaches up and yanks them out.

“Jesus!” Chas shouts. “What the hell, John?”

“You got these because of me,” John says, frowning at the spikes of metal. “For once, I’m cleaning up.”

He tosses the metal into the trash without another word. Then he pulls a washcloth out of his pocket- Chas doesn’t ask how or why he has it- and shrugs out of his coat.

“I don’t see it like that,” Chas says as John turns on the water and wets the cloth.

“No, you don’t.” John sounds almost sad as he squeezes out the extra water. “You never do see things right when what I do is hurting you.”

“I saw it with Faust.”

“That was for Geraldine, and you know it.”

Chas does know it, and he lets the conversation drop as John raises the cloth and sets about cleaning Chas’ skin. There’s a lot of dried blood, and John seems set on getting it all. He has to turn back to the sink and rinse the cloth a couple times, but he doesn’t say anything about it. He just works the cloth over Chas’ chest and down his flank.

If this is what John needs to do not to add every injury Chas gets to the guilt hounding him, Chas can live with it.

Once the blood has been washed off, Chas expects John to head out, but he doesn’t. He pushes Chas against the sink and runs his hands over him instead, wordlessly tracing the ridges of Chas’ hips and the dips between his ribs and the line of his throat. He keeps going, taking Chas’ face in his hands and pulling on it until Chas bends and brings their faces to the same height.

“I know your shoulder isn’t healed up,” John says quietly, “but, Chas, I…”

Chas doesn’t make him finish the thought.

There’s no good way of defining it, but Chas can always taste a difference when John’s been doing magic. It’s not that John tastes different, because he doesn’t. But he does.

If Chas were the type of person who needs answers, that would drive him up the wall. He doesn’t need answers, though. He’s used to living with questions and the empty, uncomfortable places where answers ought to be.

Chas doesn’t need to know everything.

In here, he just needs John.

John kisses him hard and fast. “I brought everything,” he says against Chas’ lips. “It’s on the bed.”

“You’re a genius.”

John grins at him, the grin of a man who knows he’s got Chas in the palm of his hand, and Chas grins back, happy to be there.

John pulls Chas out the door and over to the bed with a hand on Chas’ belt buckle. Which he undoes, along with the front of Chas’ pants, while Chas is busy trying to get a kiss. Not that Chas realizes John’s done it until he’s finally getting his kiss and suddenly he feels a rush of cold air on his legs.

He must make a noise or a face because John chuckles. “I can’t believe that still works on you. Most people have wised up by now.”

“Do you have to remind me about your exes right now?” Chas asks, only a little ruffled.

“Have to? No, I don’t suppose I do. But I do love to pull the tiger’s tail. Just a little.” John stretches up for another kiss, and Chas gladly meets him halfway.

John seems content to fit his hands to Chas’ hips, but he’s got Chas just about down to his boxers while John remains almost fully dressed.

It’s getting hard to think straight; John’s moved onto kissing Chas’ neck, which has always been sensitive. And he’s still fully dressed, which is usually what Chas wants him to be, but not now. They’re in a hotel, the curtains are drawn, and Chas wants to feel every inch of John.

That’s the only excuse Chas has for doing what he does, and even he knows it’s flimsy.

To his credit, John doesn’t yell when Chas rips his shirt open. He just raises one brow and says, “Well, that’s a kink that’s going to get costly.”

He doesn’t let Chas get sidetracked with all the possibilities he’s just opened up. Chas wanted to talk about some of those, but John slides a hand down Chas’ hip and closes around his cock through his boxers.

Chas hauls John in for a hard kiss, but he can feel John smiling against his lips.

It’s all right, though. So long as John’s happy, Chas can be, too.

He’d just prefer it if John were happy and naked.

Laughing softly, John pushes Chas until he flops onto his back on the bed. Then he bends over and presses a line of kisses just above the waistband of Chas’ boxers, looking up through his lashes as he does.

Chas groans and lets his head fall back.

He feels John take hold of his waistband and lifts his hips to make it easier for John to get his boxers off. Which John does, but he does it slowly, kissing his way down Chas’ leg as he goes.

John stops when he gets to Chas’ shin. “You never scar,” he says, touching his fingers to the place where, a week ago, Chas caught an axe with his tibia.

“Is that bad?” Chas asks the ceiling.

“No,” John says in a voice that says the opposite. He doesn’t elaborate further, and Chas doesn’t make him.

One at a time, he lifts his legs when he feels John push on the back of his heel. It’s almost frightening how quickly he and John have built this wordless language. But they did. And as John tugs Chas’ socks off with a quiet noise of disgust, Chas is glad for it.

He’s glad that he can sit up and tug on the bottom of John’s shirt and know from the way John nods that Chas can undo John’s belt and thumb the button out of place and slide the zipper down its tracks. And he can pull John to his feet with a hand gripping the front of his boxers.

John lets his pants slide down his hips and hit the floor. He steps out of them quickly, and Chas can read in the way John bites his lip what he wants.

It’s odd, kissing John’s belly. After years with Renee, Chas got used to smooth skin, and he never really got close enough with any of his infrequent one night stands to want to kiss them like this. So it’s strange, feeling the hair below John’s navel catch on his beard.

It’s a feeling he wants to get used to, though.

He tugs John’s boxers down- John may be able to feign patience, but Chas can’t. He’s had to keep his hands to himself for days.

The first touch of his tongue to the head of John’s cock makes him draw a sharp breath in through his nose, and when Chas messily kisses his way down the shaft, John groans.

John has a strained relationship with religion, but the noise he makes when Chas sucks on his tip could start its own.

There’s only one worshipper in this temple, though, and he isn’t on his knees.

Chas looks up at John as he bobs his head, swallowing him down before slowly pulling off. He sucks on the tip again when he reaches it, moves his tongue so John curls his hands into fists.

John’s getting close- Chas can hear it in the way his breath is hitching- but before Chas can make him come, John gently catches his head and pulls away.

“Not yet.”

This is new. Curious, Chas lets John push at him until Chas is lying on the bed he normally would. John strips the rest of the way out of his clothes and hops up, too, grabbing the bottle of lube from the foot of the bed on his way. He settles himself on Chas’ hips, pointedly giving Chas’ cock a few light strokes before he lets it lie against his ass.

Chas’ hands find their way to John’s hips without his input. They’re solid hips, more solid than they seem when John’s wearing clothes. It’s a comforting disparity; John often looks like a waif in the aftermath of a fight with hell. It’s good to be reminded that he’s a man, not immortal but not a wisp either.

The snap of the bottle opening is a familiar sound, but it sends an electric curl of anticipation through him anyway. He tries to sit up and crane his neck so he can get a better of John working himself open, but John pushes him back down with a hand in the center of his chest.

“You’re hurt,” he says. “Let me take care of it.”

“It’s just my shoulder,” Chas argues. “And it’s practically healed already. It doesn’t matter.”

John shakes his head. “Let me.”

There’s an entire world of things John isn’t saying packed into those two words. Chas probably couldn’t begin unpacking it at his most coherent. Lying on his back on a hotel bed with John kneeling over him, fingering himself open, is about as far from coherent as he gets.

So he relents, nodding and letting himself be pushed flat.

John smiles and leans in for a quick kiss.

Instead of straightening up again, though, he shifts to the side, the hand on Chas’ chest moving with him until John’s mouth is level with Chas’ shoulder. Then he leans in, closing the space between them, and kisses the skin just below the first wound. He drops a series of kisses to Chas’ skin, moving from that cut to the other, carefully not getting too close to either.

Chas closes his eyes and lets John do what he’s going to do. It feels nice, and he can still hear John making the little noises Chas loves that mean he’s working himself open.

Slowly, so slowly Chas doesn’t realize what’s happening at first, John makes his way from Chas’ shoulder to his chest, his tongue flicking over Chas’ nipple.

Chas groans, arching into John’s mouth, and John chuckles.

“Like that, do you?” he asks as if he doesn’t know damn well that Chas does.

He runs his tongue over Chas’ nipple again, and Chas feels John's smile as he bites his tongue against the noise he wants to make.

Slowly pulling back and sitting up, John smirks at him.

Chas doesn’t get to ask him what the smirk is for; John has the lube uncapped and is pouring it into his palm, and Chas, like any well-trained man, knows what comes next.

Despite knowing it's coming, the feeling of John’s slick hand closing around his cock makes Chas’ hips twitch.

John’s smirk grows, but he doesn’t say anything, just gives Chas a few firm strokes before he shuffles forward, pulling his knees in as he does, and guides Chas’ cock into him.

He sinks down slowly, head tilted back and back arched. Chas can’t help but follow the line of his body to John’s cock.

Chas’ hand isn’t slicked, but he figures John won’t mind if Chas is just touching him a little.

“Fuck,” John breathes when Chas runs his thumb over the tip. Chas smiles to himself, pleased to have a distraction from the feeling of John taking him in; John never seems to understand how serious Chas is when he says it takes everything in him not to come the moment he pushes in.

“I know it looks like you’re fucking me,” John says when his ass is flush with Chas, “but you’re not.”

Chas frowns, not following and not liking it. “What are you-”

“I,” John continues over him, “am fucking you. And you are going to lie back and not help.”

“But-”

In a move exactly as dirty as Chas would expect from him, John takes himself in hand and gives himself a few strokes.

Chas probably shouldn’t have told him how hot that is.

It’s too late now, and Chas can’t say he really minds.

When John starts moving, Chas naturally tries to meet him, but John moves back up.

“You’re not supposed to help,” John reminds him.

“Come on, John. You can’t be serious.”

John gives him a flat look.

Chas sighs. “It isn’t that simple.”

“I know that. It’s not in your nature to be taken care of. That’s why I’m doing this.”

“My shoulder-”

“Isn’t the point, and you know it.”

He does know.

“All right.”

“Good man. Now you just hold yourself still and watch as I get myself off.”

Chas chokes, or maybe coughs, and John laughs. It’s the rarest of his laughs, the one that’s pure amusement, no mocking edge. Soft and rolling like a cat’s purr.

The things Chas would do to hear it run dark and deep.

He doesn’t tell John about any of them. He settles for moving his hands over John’s body, following his hips and thighs and around to the curve of his ass.

“Chas…” John warns.

“Not even this?” Chas asks, squeezing just hard enough that John will really feel it.

John mutters something- Chas is going to guess something profane- in a language Chas can’t even begin to guess at and draws a shaky breath. “All right, you can have that. But no more.”

Chas grins at him.

It gets hard to keep the expression in place when John sits back hard and fast, and from the smug look on his face, John knows it.

Watching John’s face as he steadily moves up and down on Chas’ cock feels like something out of a dream, but he’s never had a dream that remembered to keep John’s prickliness.

He gets so caught up in not giving into the feeling of John riding him and the sounds John starts making that he doesn’t realize how close John’s gotten until John’s fast breaths turn into a bitten-off shout and he comes over Chas’ chest.

Panting, he slumps forward, one hand coming up to brace against Chas’ belly while the other works him through the last of his orgasm.

“You good?” Chas asks once John’s breathing is close to normal.

John snorts. “I will be once you’ve gotten off.”

Chas tries to tell him he doesn’t have to do it, but it’s still hard to think after seeing John come like that, and John’s always been faster than Chas at this.

He reaches back and takes hold of one of Chas’ hands. Prying it off his ass, he guides it back toward his spine. But instead of the knobs of John’s vertebrae, Chas finds his fingers pressed to John’s ass where it’s stretched around Chas’s cock.

John doesn’t explain what he’s doing, and Chas doesn’t need him to.

This time, when John starts to move, Chas is ready.

It’s still difficult not to move his hips, and as he gets closer, it only gets harder.

He can feel his self-control fraying when John says, “Fuck me.”

Chas sits up too fast, but John’s telling him to come on, and it feels good to flip them over and bury his face in John’s neck as Chas finally fucks him.

If it weren’t for the hours of deni that led to it, Chas would be embarrassed at how fast he comes.

As it is, he just lets himself drop down onto John.

He’s too heavy for it to be comfortable- and he’s smeared John with his own drying come- but John doesn’t complain. He puts his arms around Chas’ waist and kisses Chas’ sweaty temple, and Chas tries to will his lungs into evening out his breathing so he can kiss John sooner.

While he waits, John moves a hand up Chas’ back, following his spine most of the way until branching off and heading for Chas’ shoulder blade, which he follows up and around to Chas’ shoulder.

“You’re healed already.”

He sounds surprised, but Chas can only shrug. “It wasn’t very traumatic.”

“I suppose not.”

Chas should get up and shower, or at least wipe himself down. John, too. But he’s tired and comfortable, and John has moved onto running his hand through Chas’ hair, which Chas has always liked.

He’s drifting off before he knows it, but there’s no reason to fight it. John’s here, and he’s going to be here when Chas wakes up.

Everything isn’t fine, but here, in this hotel room, with John pressed against him, it isn’t bad.

**Author's Note:**

> this was supposed to be john getting hurt unnecessarily in order to secure more of chas' attention, but it sort of... didn't go that way


End file.
